Dirty but good: Winemaker hit by floods sells wine bottles covered in mud in five days

An Italian winery, which was flooded in Campania following heavy rains on October 15, has managed to sell all its ‘damaged’ wine bottles thanks to a clever campaign on social media.

The campaign was called, Prendici cosi! Siamo #SporcheMaBuone (Take us how we are, we are dirty but good) was launched by the winery Cantina di Solopaca. It aimed to sell over 60,000 bottles that had been covered with mud following the flooding. In the poster to accompany the campaign, the winery said that ‘behind this glass bottle, there is the fruit of the earth that has tried to wash us away.”

The bottles, covered in mud, were put on sale in the same condition in which they had been found.

All bottles were sold within five days. The winery said that they were happy and sad at the same time to communicate that they had sold all the ‘muddy’ bottles of wine. “We would like to thank you for your generosity. Within five days, we have sold all the bottles that we recovered. You have been simply marvellous. We are proud of you,” Cantina di Solopaca said on Facebook.

The winery has also asked its clients to share photos of the bottles they had bought on Facebook.

The winery is one of the oldest agricultural co-operatives in the Campania region of Italy and also one of the largest producers of the region.

Among the wines produced is the Solopaca DOC, the first wine of Sannio to have been recognised as a D.O.C. wine in 1974. The grape varieties produced are the Falanghina, Aglianico, Greco and Fiano. In recent years, they have also started to grow more traditional grapes such as Coda de Volpe and Barbera.

The winery has a range of different wines that are distributed not just in Italy but also around the world.